DYING AESTHETIC SENSE OF
BURNED OUT CORPORATE EMPLOYEES: A SOCIAL DISASTER
Mohammad
Rizwan Junaid
Pakistan
Institute of Management, Ministry of Industries, Govt. of Pakistan
E-mail: falsafi_28@yahoo.com
Submission: 08/11/2012
Accept: 05/12/2012
ABSTRACT
The intrinsic focus of this paper is
to comprehend the causes of societal unrest, diminishing family values, absence
of happiness, less or no involvement of corporate employees in social
activities, increasing number of psycho patients, disturbed individuals,
trackless-ness and a rising sense of alienation. The direct
link of all these effects is with corporate world as overburdened, stressed and
fatigued employees who are always under extreme stress referencing their jobs
are losing or have lost most of their aesthetic sense and loss of aesthetic
sense takes away the sense of beauty in objects, actions, relations and values
and eventually Man appears mechanical like machines and this robotics damages
the entire family life and death of family lives leave a hollow sphere in a
society and these hollow spheres are on the rise round the globe these days.
This paper attempts to highlight the causes and their corresponding effects and
invite corporate stalwarts to read the writing of the wall without further
wastage of time before it is too late.
Key-words: Corporate employees, Society, Disaster
1. INTRODUCTION
Balance is the most significant
notion that depicts the intrinsic nature of every organic being, it can be defined as a state of bodily equilibrium; a stable
mental or physical state, emotional stability; to bring into or maintain in a
state of equilibrium; (Author, 2009). Every human in a
society passes his life in a dualistic posture; one facet is outside the house
as a productive individual in purely objective capacity and other inside the
house or in the inner circle with family and friends in subjective capacity;
and needs extensive balance in these two aligned but altogether different
spheres of life (Boswell, 2007); as, if the balance is not maintained and
fundamental harmony is missing from this very relationship between Factory and
Family, between company and companion and finally between work and welfare then
we will be marching towards permanent disaster (Williams, 2000) in terms of
family network, social values, pleasure, happiness, participation, societal
involvement etc.
Aesthetics is a branch of philosophy deals with the nature of beauty, art,
taste , creation and appreciation of beauty (Merriam-Webster, 2012);
Personal aesthetics, as defined by Nadir Afonso in his geometry
based aesthetic theory rational aesthetics within an intuitive art; is
searching for absolute and the feelings of total exactitude (Galeria Alvarez,
1974) while social aesthetics is commonly participative/shared form of
creativity, acceptance of socialist realism in the close context of society and
with reference to individual existence (Vej, 2011).
The prime focus of
this paper is to look into the sharp decline in aesthetic sense of corporate
employees due to the significant work-life imblance and job related stress, and
the aftereffects of this decline on the individual, family and social circle;
furthermore, this paper derives the subsequent conclusion in the very right
perpsective of identified organizational factors that causes the situation of
distress and leaves an employee isolated from his own work, society and
consequently himself.
Significance of the Study
There are number of studies available
which discuss work-life balance as;
(Caproni, 2004;Fincham, 2008;Caproni 1997;Byrne,
2005;McDougallb, 2004;Hughes, 2002;Ker, 2003;Blanchard, 2012; Berman, 2002) and
many others and in continuation of the same there are noteworthy studies
available in the area of job related
stress as: (Kazmi, 2008; Rahim, 2010; Ahmad, 2009;Subbulaxmi, 2002; Mathur , 2011;NIOSH, 1999; EFILW, 2007; Shain,
1999; Higgins, 2005; Meglino, 1977) but
there is a significant room available to look into the damage done by this
imbalance and job related stress in terms of diminishing aesthetic sense among
these corporate employees and the relevant after affects on their families,
societies and eventually themselves.
Hypothesis
H-1: There is a significant relationship between job
related problems (imbalance and stress) and dying aesthetic sense of corporate
employees
Research Methodology
The research methodology employed in this study is based
upon previous studies, research initiatives, books, relevant articles and excerpts
from experts’ opinion in close relevance with the said subject and adequte to
prove the formed hypothesis. These contributions with thorough relevancy pave
the way towards building a solid and candid foundation needed to understand the
issue and its different dimensions.
2.
REVIEW
OF RELATED LITERATURE
Aestheticism is a very old and
established school of philosophy which took a new turn
in the beginning of 19th century; that was basically a movement in
19th century focusing European region which emphasized the aesthetic
value in performing Arts and Visual Arts (Denney, 2000) in contrast
to political or socio-political value. It discussed the aesthetic sense in
every physical object and Metaphysical essence.
Aesthetics as captioned above is a well-defined branch of
philosophy which deals with Nature of beauty, Art and Taste with a prime focus
upon creation and appreciation of beauty (Dictionary, 2011); it can further be elaborated as the study of sensory emotional values
and often named as judgment of sentiments and tastes (Zangwill, 2008). Baumgarten, a renowned German philosopher, established
aesthetics in order to frame the study of ‘TASTE’ as good and bad
"taste," consequently good and bad art, connecting good taste with
beauty (Gottlied, 2004). He took the
discussion further and described ‘taste’ in its broader connotation, as the
aptitude to judge according to the senses, rather than in the light of
intellect. This specific judgment of taste is closely linked
with the core and focused feelings of pleasure or displeasure. Aesthetics in
its pure scientific form is, for Baumgarten, an inference of the rules or
principles of imaginative or natural beauty derived from individual "taste." Immanuel Kant (Kant, 1999) endorsed the said concept of
Baugmarten and strongly advocated that an aesthetic judgment was idiosyncratic
and subjective in that particular sense that it related to the internal feeling
of pleasure or displeasure and not to any potentials in an exterior body. Immanuel Kant clarified this concept as beauty was fundamentally a clear sign of Morality
as Morality stood for balance and every good soul enjoys nature in its fullest
sense (Kant, 1964).
Aesthetic concept is not a set of rules
being governed by further rules and focused regulations but needs an
intensified form of sensitivity which can be called as taste, compassion or
judgment and prime focus of this perceptive proportion is Unity as Art is
expression and the very first benchmark which is needed for the approval is
unity, an image of unity of things and mind which it expresses (Parker, 2003). Guy Sircello encircles aesthetic
as the close combination of love (Sircello,
1975), beauty (Sircello, 1989) and
sublimity (Sircello, 1993).
The Aesthetic sense with
regard to physical object is primarily a search for balance, harmony and unity
as all these attributes exemplify the physical completeness or ‘totality’ of an
object. In fact, the fulcrum of aesthetic sense is in somewhere very deep
within a human and it is that sense which encourages or motivates a person to
appreciate beauty, any object of beauty influences one’s personality and leads
the person into a higher level of enjoying beauty (Xuxiao, 2010). It is noted here that aesthetic in
its purest form is a scientific discipline which examines the common doctrines
of advancement of man’s aesthetic association to reality, and specifically of
art as a particular form of social cognizance. It can be said
that generally aesthetics examines the relationship between Man and reality and
in particular their highest form, (Nedozchiwin,
1972).
Precisely, we are talking of a composite balance with in
an object and between objects; the balance within an object reveals the
composition of elements needed to form that object as their proportionate
relationship and existence provides the sense of beauty and completeness and on
the other hand, when we talk of balance between two objects or among objects so
we divert our discussion towards the very balance that froms the entire
universe particularly and cosmos generally (Embree, 2010). This balannce is the
Moral sense that is linked to the corrosponding aesthetic sense of humans, by
developing an analogy between moral and other senses, we can comprehend the
moral sense. (Adorno, 1997) while its symphonic form is
in Musical pieces. It is fairly not needed to develop
an independent aesthetic sense faculty in terms to perceive and to appreciate
beauty in this universe. The pool of basic five senses are more than enough to
serve this very purpose; nonetheless, simply spotting something beautiful is
not by itself sufficient to escalate its beauty.
It is for sure that perfect vision and hearing capacities are not a
valid reason regarding development of this aesthetic sense, so it means that it
is something extra, something additional, something that is not solely
dependent upon perfection of vision and hearing and if we relate it to the
perfection of vision and gearing then it means that we are limiting it to an
undefined core. Updating with reference to the beauty of an object is
the focus of aesthetic sense, (Wollheim, 1980)
Hence, we can analogically comprehend the moral sense as providing us
information of what is good. People with an operative moral sense develop a
flawless impression of inexactness when they see (or imagine) somebody being
mugged.
This aesthetic sense is
about loving and appraising beauty and harmony in society, people around one
and eventually in oneself, If one has
love for beauty in life, in people, in nature, in material things, in space,
then one is sensitive to own emotions, others’ emotions, own environment, own development
for transformation; in order to be
able to live aesthetically is like living
spiritually and appreciating beauty in everything exists around in
surroundings, it envelops a search of beauty in the world around you, in every
existing object and on top of it in your
own feelings, discourse and deed, (Parakh, 2011) It consoloidates the concept of an integral
and constant connection between ethics
and aesthetics. Moral
Values and aesthtics go hand in hand, not in their very applied sense but also
in theoraticl sense (Schellekens, 2007) and while making judgement regarding
beautification of an object; we take into consideration the relevant notions
that are attached with the word’aesthetics’ as experiences, concepts, properties, or words; (Zangwill, 2010) aesthetic attributes
are those that are credited in aesthetic judgments; aesthetic experiences are
those that ground aesthetic judgments; aesthetic concepts are those that are
deployed in aesthetic judgments; and aesthetic words are those that are typically
used in the linguistic expression of aesthetic judgments.
In a well
knitted combination, the primary concept of aesthetics is developed beneath the
very existence of a society and exemplifies its being in the perspective of
social norms and values, it can be named with reference to its closest context
and in relaity as Social Aesthetics which
is an artisitc attitude towards the world of acts (Larsen, 1999) and acts are
undertaken in a social setup in which we live and pass our lives with other
people, the sociology of aesthetics sets the dimension of personality
development. John Dewey expresses the same as that
somebody who merely appears in a state of anger by exhibiting it is not
precisely expressing
anger. Expression does not exemplify the real state of a person as it can be a
reaction against something and that specific act cannot be
named as expressive in the very right perspective of the said subject. (Dewey,1980).
Human beings in a society add value in the form of their
contribution, keeping their individuality intact and this contribution
advocates the mental balance, the psychological state of an individual who
functions at a satisfactory emotional level and behavioral adjustment, (Thesaurus, 2012) and state of the impulses
that draw these contributions in the final state. Tired, bored, fatigued,
dejected and un-happy individuals cannot contribute what they are supposed to and this state shatters the social balance.
Job related Stress
Stress is a psycho-physiological
process, which results from the interaction of the individual with the
environment (Luthans, 1998) and results in disturbances caused to the
physiological, psychological and social systems, depending upon individual
characteristics and psychological processes. Organizational stress can be
defined (Henry,
2008) as an emotional,
cognitive, behavioral and physiological response to the aggressive and harmful
aspects of work, work environment and organizational climate. It is a condition
characterized by feelings of helplessness in solving tasks.
The American Institute of Stress estimates that job-related stress
costs the United States industry $300 billion annually in absenteeism costs,
diminished productivity, employee turnover, workers’ compensation and medical
insurance & health care expenditures are nearly fifty percent higher for
workers who report high levels of stress (NIOSH, 1999) ongoing medical costs,
direct income loss, transport costs and losses related to lifestyle changes can
result in counter-productive workplaces and significant financial loss to
employees and employers. The European Agency for Safety
and Health at Work found that 28 percent of workers in the European Union
reported stress-related health problems. This amounts to 41 million EU workers
affected by work-related stress each year and around 600 million working days
per year lost across the EU for work-related health reasons (Ward, 2002)
In addition, the British Health and Safety Executive (HSE, 1990) revealed that at least half of all days lost in the UK
were due to stress related illnesses.
The cost to Britain's economy is estimated at approximately 6.7 million days lost per
year, costing society between £3.7 and £3.8 billion. Job related stress is recognized world-wide
as a major challenge to individual mental and physical health, and
organizational health (ILO 1986). Stressed workers are also more likely to be
unhealthy, poorly motivated, less productive and less safe at work, and their
organizations are less likely to succeed in a competitive market. By some estimates work-related stress costs the national economy a
staggering amount in sick pay, lost productivity, health care and litigation
costs. (Palmer, 2004). The Health &
Safety Commission (Council, 2007) defines
stress at work as: ‘Stress is the adverse reaction
that people have to excessive pressures or other types of demand placed upon
them’. Every job brings its own pressures and demands; these are an unavoidable
part of working life.
Causes of Job Stress
World
Health organization in one of its report characterizes the psychological
hazards at the work place and come up with the following core areas which generate a psychological imbalance among
individuals at work:
The above table shows that a single cause of stress can
be identified in number of ways and so is the case with the affetc of these
multi-dimensional ways/identifiers on employees and consequently their
performance at the work place.
Table
1: {Stressors and Identifiers}
Stressor |
Identifiers |
Job
content |
Lack of variety or
short work cycles, fragmented or meaningless work, under use of skills, high
uncertainty, continuous exposure to people through work |
Workload & work pace |
Work overload or
under load, machine pacing, high levels of time pressure, continually subject
to deadlines |
Work schedule |
Shift working, night
shifts, inflexible work schedules, unpredictable hours, long or unsociable
hours |
Control |
Low participation in
decision making, lack of control over workload, pacing, etc. |
Environment and Equipment |
Inadequate equipment availability,
suitability or maintenance; poor environmental conditions such as lack of
space, poor lighting, excessive noise |
Organizational culture & Function |
Poor communication,
low levels of support for problem solving and personal development, lack of
definition of, or agreement on, organizational objectives |
Role in Organization |
Role ambiguity, role
conflict, and responsibility for people |
Career development |
Career stagnation and
uncertainty, under promotion or over promotion, poor pay, job insecurity, low
social value to work |
Home-Work Interface |
Conflicting demands
of work and home, low support at home, dual career problems |
(Jain, 2010)
In underlining the causes of job related stress, working
conditions and Worker’s personality profiles play significant role. It so
happens that what is a stressful working condition for one perosn may not be
the same for another person, National Institue of Occupational Health has taken
the discussion further and conclude that even though the prominence of individual
differences is always prevailing, but according to provided and available
scientific evidences, definite working conditions, as extreme workload strains
and incompatible anticipations, appear full of stress for most of the people.
The principle argument jumps out of these evidences advocates for higher
emphasis on working conditions as the focal cause of workplace stress (NIOSH,
1999). The same report highlights certain job conditions that may lead to
stress as:
Rebecca Maxon in her article “Stress
in the Workplace: A Costly Epidemic” captions stress management as the most
important challenge of 21st century. She further quoted significant
job related stresses, referencing Holmes-Rahe Life Events Scale that rates the
level of stress caused by scores of social, personal and occupational stress
related events; as: firings, business readjustments, changes in financial
status, altered responsibilities, a switch to a different line of work, trouble
with the boss, variations in work hours or conditions, retirement and
vacations. (Maxon, 1999).
Table 2: {Stress related Job
Conditions}
The Design of Task |
Heavy workload, infrequent rest breaks, long
working hours and shiftwork; hectic and routine tasks that have little
inherent meaning, do not utilize workers' skills, and provide little sense of
control. |
Management Style |
Lack of participation by workers in
decision-making, poor communication in the organization, lack of
family-friendly policies |
Interpersonal Relationships |
Poor social environment and lack of support
or help from coworkers and supervisors. |
Work Roles |
Conflicting or uncertain job expectations,
too much responsibility, too many "hats to wear". |
Career Concerns |
Job insecurity and lack of opportunity for
growth, advancement, or promotion; rapid changes for which workers are
unprepared |
Environmental
Conditions |
Unpleasant
or dangerous physical conditions such as crowding, noise, air pollution, or
ergonomic problems. |
(NIOSH, 1999)
Job related
stress caused scores of psychological and physiological imbalances in a
worker’s personality that eventually leaves him distressed and distorted as the
stress at the work place diminshes the possibility of maintaining a balance
between home and work and unless this balance is gained or sorted out, a worker
will not be in a position to come up
with his best.
Work Life Balance
Industrial
revolution (1750-1850) (Hoppit, 2011) was
the period in which the ideology of work-leisure dichotomy invented and
established; where work was given 1st
preference as main activity in any society and the first recognition of adult
male, who in accumulation, was an employee (Thomas, 1964). On
the other hand all those activitie that come under leisure were given marginal considerations and less/no importance
(Voth, 2000 ;Browne, 2006; Burke, 1995). Leisure
or free time is the time spent away from any professional and personal
obligation, that time is meant for oneself and spent in any activity tend to
provide a sense of menatal/physical relaxation,recreation and plaeasure
(Andorka, 1987; Robinson, 1997). The balance between work and personal life is
key for lasting growth and success; the anthropolgical definition of happiness is minimum possible
separation between work and play (Paul Krassner, 1963) in order to keep an
individual healthy and productive; correspondingly an imbalance separation
generates psychological disoreders, alienation and detachment towards work and
life (Lambert M. Surhone, 2010).
The
immediate resultant factor of this psychological disorder is multi-dimensional;
the individual seems struggling with a conflicting family life (Williams, 2010)
while at the same time their companies are facing odds because of their
problematic behavior and paying the cost (Emslie, 2009) in terms of losses at
different levels. Managers are involved in smart
tasks which needs extreme mental balance, personal composure, problem solving
and decision making skills; in close alignment with planning, organizing,
leading and controlling as core management functions (Gomez-Mejia & Cardy,
2008).Their productive efficency {maximum output with least input} surfaces in
positive terms when they play their captioned role as desired/required by
parent organization (Standish, 1997).
Corporate World ‘Nausia’
Working dynamics and values of
Corporate World has changed a lot and in this very 21st century,
Global economic recession has engulfed the companies round the world. Recession
in Economics can be defined as, recession is a
business cycle contraction, a general slowdown in economic activity (Meriam-Webster, 2008). Leaks and drips in economic
activity generates unemploymemt, the extreme impression of a period of
recession on overall employment may not be felt for many living and struggling
classes. A Research study in Britain reveals that un-skilled, low-skilled,
low-educated workers and the youngsters are most susceptible to unemployment in
a downturn (Vaitilingam, 2010). The
standard of living of those who are dependent on wages and salaries are the
more affected ones by recessions as compared to those who rely on fixed incomes
or social benefits.
In the very right perspective of the
problems and issues cited above the corporate greed, employee exploitation,
un-ethical decision making are the soring ailments eating out the health of
corporate world and placing it on the top of the Mafia list. Bruce A. Dixon captioned in his report that Corporations
are immensely wealthy, taxed and regulated more lightly than human beings,
protected by law from most kinds of accountability, and are immortal. A human,
who kills someone, even by accident, can be held civilly or criminally liable,
stripped of all property and assets, imprisoned or put to death. Corporations
can poison and kill thousands at a time, without even the need for apologies.
Texas alone puts a couple of people to
death every month. When was the last time a corporation had its assets
confiscated? Why isn't there a corporate death penalty? (Dixon, 2010 ). In fact, the
Corporate world is pacing fast towards its own death and there would be a time when the corporate stalwarts will be
questioned openly by the Masses for their wrong doings.
Fig:
1 (The cause-effect cycle) Affect
The above framework carries three major causes that have
been described earlier with reference to the prominent studies, that affect an
employee and consequently the affected employee starts losing his aesthetic
sense. We look into the highlighted sub-categories, which describe the gradual
death of aesthetic sense in a row in order to look into the relationship
between the two.
Dissatisfaction
or Dissatisfied employees hate the work place, they hate management as they
feel that they are not being treated well and even they do not trust their
Management and what is being told by their Management. They
feel poorly paid, and that they are being forced to shoulder and compromise the
cost of their health compensation plan, even they develop a permanent feeling
that their jobs are tarnishing the quality of their family life and they are
being turned into an isolated individual with directionless life. The core of
these feelings is that they feel themselves defenseless in order to turn the
tables in their favor. They have constant fears of losing their jobs with the
trauma that if they go for another employment opportunity then they had to come
across the same aura all the way with same or similar set of problems. (Katcher, 2006) These unhappy employees cannot add any value to their jobs,
to their organization and even to their families and themselves.
A
poll by Known UK Recruiter Monster reveals that a majority of UK employees are
dissatisfied with their jobs and they are unhappy as they feel that their
contributions towards their companies are not being so appreciated as it ought
to be. In addition, employees in the UK felt that their development needs were
not being paid due attention, with 73 per cent claiming their managers were not
investing enough in staff training or development. (Deshayes, 2011). This attitude diverts the effort of an employee towards
unhappiness and displeasure and the resultant factor of this mental syndrome is
frustration which eventually shatters out other relationships.
This state of unhappiness leads an individual towards
depression and Depression is a state of low temper and loathing to commotion that
can disturb a person's feelings, conduct, spirits and bodily well-being. (Salmans, 1997) Depressed people may feel sad,
nervous, hollow, desperate, stranded, ignorant, mortified, ill-tempered, or
agitated. They keep on and may lose interest in activities that once were pleasurable
for them, they come across trackless eating habits in terms of loss of appetite
or overeating, or problems while concentrating on specific task, memorizing
particulars or making decisions; and may anticipate or endeavor to end their
lives, sleeplessness, unnecessary slumbering, exhaustion, loss of energy, or
twinges, discomforts or digestive difficulties that offer intense resistance
while being treated (NIMH, 2009); eventually
these depressed people do not add any value to life and most of the time their
family life seems endangered as they cannot give their fullest possible
input required to intact relations. They cannot play good husband, father and
friend and this mental state leaves them in isolation. A mentally healthy
person is prone to give his best not only in terms of his presence with the
family but also through his intellect, involvement and input. Thomas Jefferson
once said, “The happiest moments of my life have been the few which I have
passed at home in the bosom of my family.”
(Jefferson, 2011)
Unhappiness is
an apparent state of depression which is a definite state of stumpy temper and
antipathy to the function that may affect a person’s feelings, behavior,
thought process and physical balanced state
(Salmans,1997). National Institute of Mental Health captioned depressed people
as individual survive in a state of sadness, unhappiness, emptiness,
hoplessness, regrets and hatred; they are prone to loose interest in activities
that were plesurable for them (NIMH, 2009). Take the case of corporate
employees work in night shifts which may increase their chances to have more
earnings but it leaves these employees lonely and isolated due to lack of
contact with their families and social circle (Goswami, 2012) and eventually
their mode of work affect them psychology and psychophysiologically (Akerstedt,
1990). In fact the increasing demand of work generates dissatisfaction and this
sense of dissatisfaction ignites sense of unhappiness (Mulhern, 1983).
Quality of work life is even a very
strong area that not only affects the professioal profile of an employee but
the personal profile of the same as well (Che Rose & Beh L.S, 2006); over
all work environment, behavior of supervisors, job satisfaction and
organizational commitment keeps an employee happy and he strives more and
places his/her share for imporvement (Sirgy, 2001); in the respective mode, if
the work interfares with the workers’ personl life then it appears as a
sitution of depression and dejection (Ensher, 2001) which squeezes the options
for decision making and the delay exaggerates depression level of the employee
Alineation
refers to the estrangement that occurs in the
relation between an individual and that to which he or she is relating. This
break in the relations occurs in a variety of forms, such as the estrangements
between an individual and his or her social community, natural environment; own
self and
even GOD. (Kwak, 2011); the term is
further defined as a withdrawing or
separation of a person or a person's affections from an object or position of
former attachment (Webster, 2011). Karl Marx further elaborated the same in his
famous Theory of Alienation, can be
found in his manyscripts written in the year 1844, refers
to the separation of things that naturally belong together, or to put
antagonism between things that are properly in harmony. In the concept's most
important use, it refers to the social alienation of people from aspects of
their "human nature" (Gattungswesen, usually translated as
'species-essence' or 'species-being'); He believed that alienation is a
systematic result of capitalism. (Marx, 1964).
It can easily be concluded that Alienation is a permanent
state of mind which governs a human in an estranged direction. In the words of
Hegel, the unhappy consciousness is in a divided form aginst its own self,
depart from its ownself which has already been lost and the physical existence
seems meaningless (Avineri, 1972). Marx used fundamentally
the identical concept to interpret the state of contemporary individuals — specifically
current pay laborers — who are dispossessed of a pleasing manner of life for
the reason that their life-activity, as socially productive agents, is devoid
of any sentiments of collective action or satisfaction, and gives them no
ownership over their own lives or their products. In contemporary society,
individuals are alienated, since that their common human essence, the real
co-operative activity which rationally ties them, is power-less in their lives,
which are subject to an merciless power — created by them, but splitting and controlling
them instead of being subject to their united will. (Gouldner, 1980)
Social
Disaster
The
social setup comprises of an individual and family, and the more this
relationship is shattered the social balance seems in jeopardy, (Caproni , 2004) as satisfied employees blessed with
flexible working hours (Anderson, 2010 ) are active and strong social members
with more control over their livs outside work (Byrne,2005) and parallel conrol
of their lives at the work place. It is being closely studied by oranizations
round the globe that unless the family life is well in control of their
employees their level of concetration or requried level of commitment cannot be
obtined as they are not leading a healtheir life (Berman,2002) and ‘are not
maintaining a healtheir life style. Happiness and sense of satisfaction impact
both the professional and personal life of an employee (Goodman, 2011) as whole
human life is networked and we cannot pull apart the loops to make separate
chains (Urry, 2003). A survey reveals that every third of UK employees are
unhappy in their jobs and it even shows in their personal lives as well
(Oprita, 2011). The happy worker
hypothesis (Stahl, 2004) is very
valid in terms to have peope full of life so that they may lead their social
lives with strong personality (Bowling, 2007).
The increasing rate of workers’ suicide at Foxconn China
exposes the workplace design and atmospehre; Xiang
Qian committed suicide on Jnuary 3rd 2010; Ma's sister, Ma Li Qun,
22, also worked for Foxconn and said that they work under extreme pressure and were not allowed to talk during work,
even more they were not permitted to look around and their timings were noted
through a stop watch and heavily fined for any mistake. She said her brother was orally and expressively ill-treated by Foxconn supervisors. "My brother wasn't happy at
Foxconn. In the beginning he worked quite slowly and his superiors would scold
him. They made him clean the toilets for a month." The Ma family does not
believe that their son committed suicide and claim that he was murdered,
although it's not clear if there is any evidence
to support such a claim (Loyd,2010). There
has been an open uproar over the suicides of 24 employees at France Telecom due
to extensive stress. The most recent victim, a former law student – aged 32
years, jumped out of her office window leaving suicide note for her father.
Another
blamed "management by terror" for driving him above the levels, “I am
committing suicide because of my work at France Telecom. That's the only reason
(Corkindale, 2009). The economic recession in the year 2008 in USA had turned
out to be the year of depression with increasing number of suicide due to job
related complexities, competitiveness and joblessness (Al-Hail, 2009) It is not only the case with rank and file employees but
the suicide of Peregrine Financial CEO really caused alarm as financial
irregularities and some accounting discrepancies pushed him to take his life (Suhr, 2012). Sudharshan was reprimended and
threatened by the project manager just a few minutes before he dropped himself
from the 11th floor and died on the sopt (Reporter, 2010). In this
very context, the alarming increase in suicide cases in Japan, crossed 32,000 in
the year 2006, when probed appeared that many employees were forced to
work harder due to ongoing business reformation; frequent cases of suicide have
officially been acknowledged as related to depression originating from overwork
over a decade (Mutsuhiro Nakao, 2008) while government
has intorduced many counselling and rehabilitation schemes to reduce the number
of suicide and suicidal attempts.
A single case of suicide in any
society exposes the dents in socio-economical and socio-cultural cover and
exposes the strength of inter personal relationship at different levels,
suicide is intentionaly causing one’s own death under the influence of
depression, problematic relationship and economic difficulties (Stone, 2001).
The mental approach before suicide or detachement and/or loss of personal
identity for a while; are the relevant outcomes that exemplify the mental state of the one going for such an
extreme attempt and in fact it is absence of aesthetic sense, the sense of
beauty, contention and peace.
Work related problems disturb and
disrupt whole family and under stress employee cannot control these two worlds
moving in opposite directions (Ireland, 2006); especially in the case of
project based employment as it needs more time and extra efforts and employees
in this specific cadre are exposed to more work-family encounters and emotional
collapse (Francis, 2004). Actually, if
we look closely then high rates of divorce, lower rates of re-marriages, single
parents/zero parents syndrome are some of the social indicators that tell us
the changing situation of the family in these changing circumstances (Burgess,
1994); on the contrary, the living families are experiencing more situations of
domestic violence, serious depression, alsohol abuse, suicidal attempts etc.,
as an outcome of demanding occupational responsibilities (PEF, 2006).
The entire situation seems vague as
technological advancements and inventions have further developed a corner of
isolation for an individual. Despite, stress, dissatisfactions and imbalance
work-life, one is more exposed to couple of those gadgets that have deprived
him of his very privacy and a chance to maintain sound intra-personal and
interpersonal relationship. Stress, dissatisfaction and alienation envelops an employee in
such a way that he/she cannot act in accordance with his/her personal and
social requirements. We need to understand that every human is living under the
cover of many facets, as an employee, Father, Husband, Son and someone else for
many some ones. It is to be understood that the social structure is already
diverting towards Isolation ; technological advancements has created more rooms
for a person to be a single person as nowadays, a person passes more time with
his mobile, iphone, ipod, Internet and TV as compared to his interaction with
other individual. A general survey reveals that average adult Americans feel
more socially isolated because of the rise of the internet and cell phones (OLSEN, 2009). Our subject matter is not
technological advancements and its impact on social life but the point is that
these gadgets which are now a regular part of our lives have reduced many
options to be with one another as most of the leisure time is being spent with
these.
The time we have, if not passed in a way in which it must
be then it will definitely be a disaster; work-life balance is in totters and
people are compromising on so many things as there are very meagre
opportunities in this economically dented era. Psychoanalysts
detect improbability as the foremost approach to life in the postmodern
society. (Reich, 2010) The amount of
pressure executed by the society on the humans caused this uncertainty. It is
the uncertainty to fail, nonetheless the fears of limitations, fear of not achieving what is expected by the
society and a never ending of having being recognized in all concerned areas
and spheres of life. A non-stop
competition is the tag mark of today’s society. Appearance, occupation,
education of the children - everything is compared to a media staged ideal. Everything
should be perfect, because this deep-rooted abhorrence to all normal, the
pathological pursue to excellence - these are hoary customs. Whoever wants more
- on the job, from the partner, from the children, from themselves - will one
day be burned out and empty inside. He is then faced with the realization that
perfection does not exist (Poelchau, 2010) but
till that time there will not be any room to hide and any place left to go.
3.
CONCLUSION
The prime focus of this paper is to establish arguments
in favour of the captioned hypothesis that work related problems and dying
aesthetic sense of corporate employees. The literature presented above is a
candidi selection of those research pieces that seemed more opt and adequate to
prove the point. It is such a wide topic that much can be written with
reference to related context but our fundamental aim was to establish the
conceptual ground for better understanding of aesthetic coupled with stress and
work-life balance.
All the research articles refered to support the point
are well in accordnace with the said subject and most of them are reserch
studies based upon empirical findings. The intrinsic concentration was on the
relatonship between an employee and employer, the ups-downs of this
relationship and its impact on the personal life of the same employee including
his family and social circle, the growing number of suicide cases, sense of
alineation, depression, frustration and isolation is stretching living
opportunitities for a corporte employee till the last point of survival.
The primary findings presented in this paper can be
summrized as:
·
Work related stress and work life balance are the
two core causes that affect an employee’s professional as well as personal life
·
Dissatisfaction, unhappiness and alienation are
the derived affects of the captioned causes.
·
Social life and social circle is experiencing
extreme damages owing to imbalance work-life situations
·
High paid workers are committing suicide and the
rate of committing suicide is increasing by every passing day in
industrialized, established and strong economies vitalizes the missing link
between man and society.
As captioned much has been written and much can be
writtent, the need is to go for quantitative, empirical, positivist research
studies to cover this sensitive area in a concrete manner. Interestingly,
findings in many researches contain essense of generalizability as we talk of
human equation and this equation seems identical in its very context. There ar
emany studies available that discuss work related stress but there is still a
significant room avaialble to link the factory with the family.
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